Chapter 83
Nadia’s POV
They say that when you die, your life flashes before your eyes.
I always thought that was just a human myth, something they tell themselves to make death seem less terrifying.
But as I felt the wolf poison spreading through my body, burning my veins and squeezing my heart, memories washed over me like ocean waves–Adrian’s ocean, the scent I’d first fallen in love with when I was just thirteen years old.
My mother died when I was nine. Cancer, the human doctors said–one of the few diseases that even werewolf healing couldn’t overcome.
My Father never quite recovered. He buried his grief beneath an endless parade of women, coming home late smelling of perfume and sex, leaving me to navigate the treacherous waters of adolescence alone.
No one teaches a teenage girl how to manage her first period when it comes early, how to handle the stares when her body develops faster than her peers, or how to hide her tears when she catches her reflection in the mirror–round face covered in angry red acne, body swelling no matter how little she eats.
Other teenage girls were blooming flowers, while I was just a crooked, misshapen weed.
“We don’t have training gear in your size,” the equipment manager announced loudly during combat class when I was fourteen. Maybe you should train with the adults instead of the juniors.”
Laughter rippled through the group of young wolves. I felt my cheeks burn with shame as I mumbled that my regular clothes would be fine. The Alpha’s son, Adrian, was watching from across the training field, but he was too important, too perfect to notice someone like me.
It got worse as we grew older. At sixteen, I weighed nearly 210 pounds, my face was a battlefield of cystic acne, and my self–esteem had withered to almost nothing. I’d learned to make myself invisible, to find the shadowy corners where no one would notice me, to hold my tears until I was safely alone.
That’s where I was–curled in the hidden alcove behind the pack’s storage building–when I overheard them.
“Fifty bucks says you won’t do it,” Cam Matthews challenged, his voice carrying clearly in the afternoon air.
“Do what?” another boy asked–Tim Rankin, I thought, recognizing his nasal tone.
*Ask out Nadia Bennett,” Cam replied, followed by howls of laughter from the others. “Loser of today’s fighting match has to ask the fattest, ugliest girl in the pack to the Spring Moon Dance.”
‘I’d rather die,‘ Tim declared emphatically. “I’m not desperate enough to screw a whale.”
“You think she’d even fit through the door to the dance?” another boy chimed in.
“Probably break the floor if she tried to dance!”
I pressed my fist against my mouth, biting down on my knuckles to keep from making a sound. Their words weren’t new–I’d heard variations of the same cruel jokes for years–but they still cut as deeply as any claw.
“If we’re talking about who’s taking Nadia anywhere, a deeper voice interrupted, “it’ll be none of you.”
The laughter stopped abruptly. I peered through a crack in the wall and saw Adrian standing there, his tall frame radiating the authority he’d inherited from his father.
“Alpha’s son,” Cam muttered, his previous bravado evaporating.
“Future Alpha, Adrian corrected coldly. “And I don’t appreciate hearing my pack members being discussed this way.” His amber eyes narrowed dangerously. “Twenty miles. All of you. Now. And if I hear any more of this kind of talk, you’ll be running laps until your legs fall off.”
The boys scattered like frightened rabbits, leaving Adrian alone. I tried to shrink further into my hiding place, but somehow, he knew I was there.
1/3
My head snapped up in shock. Adrian had noticed me during training?
That same evening, I cut off my long hair with kitchen scissors, leaving it short and practical. From that day forward, I maintained that short style, never letting it grow past my ears again.
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